Boris Bikes: The Statistics

A fascinating article over on the Standard offers some remarkable insights into who uses the cycle hire scheme. Among a bevy of surprises, the newspaper claims that the 'majority' of the scheme's 110,000 subscribers earn over £50,000 a year. 60%, in fact. Can that really be true? Really? Wow. The paper goes on to reveal, less surprisingly, that the typical Boripede user is a white, middle-class male residing in London. The most popular borough for subscribers is Westminster, by a long way. Barking and Dagenham comes bottom of the rack with just 144 members. The figures do not include usage by non-subscribers paying ad hoc, a service introduced only a few weeks ago. Image by Martin Deutsch in the Londonist Flickr pool.

Update: the Evening Standard don't say so, but the £50,000 figure is actually household income rather than the individual's income. (See page 233 of this PDF.) Thanks to @bat020 for the sleuthing.